This bee excavates several parallel galleries to which access is gained by a cylindrical hole.
Brazil has three groups of animals similar to the common rat - the Capromydae, Loncheridae and Psammoryctidae- the best known of which is the " tuco-tuco " (Ctenomys brasiliensis), a small burrowing animal of Rio Grande do Sul which excavates long subterranean galleries and lives on roots and bulbs.
It is a gregarious animal, living in considerable colonies in burrows, which it excavates with its nails and teeth in the sandy soil of Egypt and Arabia.
Cliona, the boring sponge, destroys the shells and so injures the oyster; the boring annelid Leucodore also excavates the shell.
The fifth abdominal segment has a pair of strong dorsal hook-like processes, by means of which the larva supports itself in the burrow which it excavates in the earth, the great head blocking the entrance with the mandibles ready to seize on any unwary insect that may venture within reach.